Official Report: search what was said in Parliament
The Official Report is a written record of public meetings of the Parliament and committees.
The Official Report search offers lots of different ways to find the information you’re looking for. The search is used as a professional tool by researchers and third-party organisations. It is also used by members of the public who may have less parliamentary awareness. This means it needs to provide the ability to run complex searches, and the ability to browse reports or perform a simple keyword search.
Searching by different views
The web version of the Official Report has three different views:
- Report: this is the whole Official Report for a particular meeting of a committee or Parliament
- Item of business: this is each individual agenda item in an Official Report. For example, Portfolio Questions would be the item of business in a Meeting of the Parliament report
- Contribution: this is each time someone has made a spoken contribution to a meeting.
Depending on the kind of search you want to do, one of these views will be the best option. The default view is to show the report for each meeting of Parliament or a committee. For a simple keyword search, the results will be shown by item of business.
Search by MSP
When you choose to search by a particular MSP, the results returned will show each spoken contribution in Parliament or a committee, ordered by date with the most recent contributions first. This will usually return a lot of results, but you can refine your search by keyword, date and/or by meeting (committee or Chamber business).
We’ve chosen to display the entirety of each MSP’s contribution in the search results. This is intended to reduce the number of times that users need to click into an actual report to get the information that they’re looking for, but in some cases it can lead to very short contributions (“Yes.”) or very long ones (Ministerial statements, for example.) We’ll keep this under review and get feedback from users on whether this approach best meets their needs.
Searching by keyword
There are two types of keyword search:
- A keyword search without quotation marks will look for every instance of each word used and rank the results by frequency and proximity. It will also include variants of the keywords using “porter stemming”. This is when the search looks for the “stem” of a word regardless of its ending. So, for example, a search for [salmon farm] will return each instance of “salmon” and each instance of “farm” as well as potentially including results for “farms”, “farmed” and “farming”.
- A keyword search with quotation marks will only return instances of that exact phrase used. So, for example, a search for “salmon farm” in quotation marks will only return instances of that exact phrase.
Combining search filters
If you select an MSP’s name from the dropdown menu, and add a phrase in quotation marks to the keyword field, then the search will return only examples of when the MSP said those exact words. You can further refine this search by adding a date range or selecting a particular committee or Meeting of the Parliament.
More complex keyword searches
It’s also possible to run basic Boolean searches. For example:
- a search for “salmon farm” AND “Loch Lomond” will return only results which include both exact phrases
- a search for “salmon farm” NOT “Loch Lomond” will return results for “salmon farm” but exclude results which also include “Loch Lomond”
- a search for “salmon farm” OR “Loch Lomond” will return all results for “salmon farm” and all results for “Loch Lomond” regardless of whether they appear together
Searching by date
There are two ways of searching by date.
You can either use the Start date and End date options to run a search across a particular date range. For example, you may know that a particular subject was discussed at some point in the last few weeks and choose a date range to reflect that.
Alternatively, you can use one of the pre-defined date ranges under “Select a time period”. These are:
- Current session (all Official Reports since the current sessions started)
- Last 6 months
- Last 12 months
- each of the previous sessions of Parliament. (Selecting the information icon above the “Select a time period” menu will give you the exact dates for each session.)
- All sessions
- You can also choose to select a custom date range, although adding a Start or End date will mean the search automatically defaults to this option.
If you search by an individual session, the list of MSPs and committees will automatically update to show only the MSPs and committees which were current during that session. For example, if you select Session 1 you will be show a list of MSPs and committees from Session 1.
If you add a custom date range which crosses more than one session of Parliament, the lists of MSPs and committees will update to show the information that was current at that time.
All Official Reports of meetings in the Debating Chamber of the Scottish Parliament.
All Official Reports of public meetings of committees.
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Displaying 1524 contributions
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Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Role of Local Government in Delivering Net Zero
Meeting date: 25 January 2022
Fiona Hyslop
Thank you. I will pass back to the convener.
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Role of Local Government in Delivering Net Zero
Meeting date: 25 January 2022
Fiona Hyslop
Thank you—it was comprehensive. I ask Barry McCulloch the same question.
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 25 January 2022
Fiona Hyslop
Liam Kerr said that the regulations are being delayed again. No—the regulations will be delayed only if the committee and the Parliament do not approve them.
The scheme is a hugely important one for tackling waste in Scotland. Undoubtedly, there have been some challenges and, indeed, disappointments along the way in trying to deliver it. However, in terms of innovation, the reach of the scheme and what it will deliver, I can tell the committee that, in my constituency, the supermarket chain Aldi has already introduced its first pilot deposit and return scheme.
Scotland wants us to get on with the scheme. Yes, we need to scrutinise it. I have listened to colleagues, and I recommend that the committee should take a strong line in scrutinising the development and implementation of the scheme. However, the Parliament has a duty and responsibility to tackle waste and to drive forward our agenda on net zero and wider environmental issues, and I strongly recommend that the committee should vote in favour of the statutory instrument.
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Subordinate Legislation
Meeting date: 25 January 2022
Fiona Hyslop
Monica Lennon covered some of the area that I wanted to ask about. Does the minister have any final message to those who are concerned about the environmental impact of plastic pollution in particular?
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Role of Local Government in Delivering Net Zero
Meeting date: 25 January 2022
Fiona Hyslop
What are the top planning, practice and regulation changes that will be most helpful for your membership to deliver net zero in the short term and the long term?
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Role of Local Government in Delivering Net Zero
Meeting date: 25 January 2022
Fiona Hyslop
Is it easier to do offsetting to address that issue than to be part of the decarbonisation agenda for pension funds and their trustees?
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Role of Local Government in Delivering Net Zero
Meeting date: 25 January 2022
Fiona Hyslop
I am glad that the witnesses could join us to share their valuable insights. I will ask you separate questions, to pursue some of the points that you have already made.
The Scottish Government has established a green heat finance task force. As its work has just started, your perspective on what that should cover would be helpful.
I will come to Jeremy Lawson first on the idea of aggregating investable propositions. I very much appreciate your comments on wider concepts and frameworks, but what does that look like in terms of aggregation? The Scottish Government has established a green investment portfolio, but even with £3 billion-worth of funding, things will be challenging, particularly given that there are subsets to that portfolio. What size of investment would your investment colleagues consider it worth coming to the table for?
Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee
Role of Local Government in Delivering Net Zero
Meeting date: 25 January 2022
Fiona Hyslop
It is about the speed and scale of co-investment between councils and private companies, which is important if we are to deliver on net zero. The Subsidy Control Bill is going through Westminster. Obviously, we want subsidy control and understand its importance but, if there is risk aversion because of the nature of that system, that could affect the scale and speed of co-investment between private companies and councils. With previous co-investments between private companies and councils, there have been streamlined schemes to help to get rapid approval. Given that we need clarity to move forward with tackling net zero, would your membership welcome some kind of streamlined scheme for approvals of subsidy by local authorities?
If you want to come back to us on that, I am happy for you to do so, but that is a live issue in the Parliament just now.
Economy and Fair Work Committee
Subsidy Control Bill
Meeting date: 19 January 2022
Fiona Hyslop
Can you make clear that the Scottish Government is in support of subsidy control measures but that they have to be the right ones for Scotland? The Subsidy Control Bill is a consequence of Brexit, but even those in favour of Brexit wanted to see economic growth. As we have heard, risk aversion is implicit in the practical measures of this legislation. If the UK Government could deal with the constitutional aspects and the asymmetry of this, everybody could focus on trying to get the bill right in terms of its measures.
If we forge ahead on net zero with a combination of contributions from the private and public sectors, there is a real danger for one of the biggest areas for economic growth, not just for Scotland but for the rest of the UK. Those practical measures, if they are not addressed—whatever your views on Brexit—will end up having a negative drag on what should be an economic growth opportunity. What are your comments on that?
Economy and Fair Work Committee
Budget Scrutiny 2022-23
Meeting date: 19 January 2022
Fiona Hyslop
Good morning, cabinet secretary. I, too, want to focus on tourism. I will begin by following up on what you said about STERG’s recommendations. Have you calculated how much its funding ask comes to?
Bearing in mind that we are talking about the budget for 2022-23, any spend on phase 2 of the tourism recovery plan to attract visitors and build confidence would be for next summer as well as this summer. If there is a clear indication that visitors need to have confidence in the sector, not including that expenditure in the budget will have an impact. How much do you think phase 2 would cost? If you are saying that you are committed to funding it and that, although you cannot put it in the budget at this stage, you want to do so during 2022-23, do you know much that would cost?
